The main driver for mmWave is Capacity!
Many believe the main reason for introducing communication in the mmWave frequency range (24 GHz and above) in 5G-NR is to allow for use cases requiring Gb/s such as VR or AR use cases. It is true that such use cases require a lot of bandwidth not existing in current sub 6 GHz frequency bands, and it is also true that 5G will be an unprecedented innovation platform for the coming decade, however the main driver is the need for more capacity in the radio spectrum.
Data consumption explosion over cellular is expected to grow exponentially and hence there will be a time, predicted to be around 2023 starting in Mega cities, where communication over the sub 6 GHz frequency bands start to reach its capacity limits.
The only way to support such data rate explosion in the world’s cellular networks is to utilize the mmWave frequency bands. In order to solve that, all wireless devices such as smartphones, both high end and low end, and even IoT devices, need in the near future to support communication in the mmWave frequency band. Therefore, mmWave communication, with all their challenges such as shorter coverage and high sensitivity for blocking radio signals by hands or other obstacles, need to be solved by a sustainable and scalable digital beamforming solution optimized from all angles of the system, not only focusing on the radio front end parts, which typically comes into one’s mind talking about mmWave radio communication, but also things such as:
– System architecture including radio and baseband interface
– Digital beamforming algorithms
– Mobility and handover procedures
– Performance and power consumption
BeammWave knows the entire system and delivers the digital beamforming architecture enabling the mass market for mmWave communication in handheld devices opening up the almost endless capacity existing in the mmWave frequency band!
